


living dead

by ell (amywaited)



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, Getting Together, Ghost?, Idiots in Love, M/M, Natasha Romanov Is a Good Bro, Steve is a ghost, Tony is a ghost, but theyre cute so we forgive them, coulson is a ghost, ghost - Freeform, i dont actually know how to describe it, i guess, idk - Freeform, just give it a try?, sibling relationships, sort of mutual pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-31
Updated: 2018-05-31
Packaged: 2019-05-16 11:55:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14810876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amywaited/pseuds/ell
Summary: Okay. Tony should probably (definitely) report this to the GDA. But you know, Steve was cute, and he wasn't doing anything wrong. And Tony did want a bit of company.





	living dead

**Author's Note:**

> set in 2058. because it futuristic (and marvel timelines are confusing) enjoy!

****

“Get me a level three ghost, stat!” Someone yells.

“Level one, people! Level one!”

“Hell, I need a level five plus now!”

It’s like that all the time. Tony’s head hurts.

“You!” Someone shouts at him, where he’s sitting on one of the chairs outside of management's offices. “What’s your level?”

Tony frowns, glancing at management and the long queue by the desks. He turns back to the ghost dressed in a slightly translucent pinstripe suit in front of him. Poor sod, dying in his work clothes. “Me?”

“Yes, you! Level?”

“Four,” Tony says, racking his brains to see if he actually remembers. Four sounds about right. 

“That’ll do,” the ghost says, grimacing. Then, “Karen! Tell the head offices that we’ve got a level four on a level five job!”

Oh, Tony thinks. It’s been ages since he’s been assigned a house, and he’s never been on a job that he’s too low to be on. His chest starts beating in a way that’s reminiscent of a heart. “Um, Sir,” He tries, “I can’t take thi-”   


“What’s your name?” Pinstripe says, pulling a clipboard off of a desk and holding a pen poised.

“Um, Tony. Tony Stark.”

“Whatever,” he says, “Fill this out, will you? You’ll be shipped off tomorrow, in case you have anyone to say goodbye to.”

Tony takes the clipboard and the pen, sighing. He fills out the questions (things like: ‘ _ How long have you been a resident of the Ghost platform? _ ’ and  _ ‘Have you taken jobs before? _ ’ Tony answers  _ fifty years _ to the first question, and  _ yes, two level one’s _ , to the second.) He hands the clipboard back, feeling jittery all over.

The man grimaces at his answers, “Only done level one’s before? Whatever. You’ll have to make do. You said you were a level four, so hopefully you’ll be able to deal with it.”   


“Deal with what, sir?” Tony asks, wiping non-existent sweat on his sweatpants. At least he died in his engineering clothes. They weren’t the most formal, but they were comfortable, and he looked sort of well put together.

“The house,” Pinstripe says, “You’ll get a debrief file in about an hour. Go back to your quarters, we’ll send it along soon.”

Tony blinks slowly. By the time his eyes open again, the man is gone. People are still shouting, so he weaves his way around them and heads to the elevator. From there, he goes to his room floor and into his single room.

 

*

 

Death isn’t as, well, as exciting as Steve was expecting. 

Sure, it was sort of sudden and he was sort of new. But he did know what he should be doing. He should be reporting to the GDA and signing on for jobs. But he wasn’t.

Screw him for wanting a little bit of freedom before backing himself into a corner and working for people again. He’s already had an entire life of that. Steve wants a fresh go. A redo. Well, sort of. 

Then someone gets assigned to his house.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Steve hisses at the unfamiliar ghost, who’s standing in the threshold looking thoroughly confused. And frustratingly cute.

“What the hell are YOU doing here?” The man retorts. “They said this house was unassigned.”

“This house is unassigned,” Steve says.

“Not anymore. I’m assigned here. Why are you here?”

“I live here!” Steve exclaims.

“You’re.. Unregistered?”

Steve huffs out a sigh. “Yes.”

The man frowns a little. “Alright. I’m Tony.”   


“You’re not gonna turn me in?” Steve asks.

Tony shakes his head. “Why should I? If you attempt to murder anyone, then yeah, I might have to do something. But for now it’s fine. What’s your name?”

“Steve,” Steve says. “Why aren’t you calling the GDA?”

“I just explained that. Besides, you’re cute and I’m lonely. And this is a level five house. I’m only level four. What level are you?”

Steve shrugs. “Six? I don’t know. I’ve never worked in one of the dispatch factories, so no one’s ever told me. But based on the books I’ve read, I should be five or six.”   


Tony whistles lowly. “A six. Wow.”

Steve shrugs, feeling embarrassed.

Tony claps his hands. “Well, then. Now that we’ve cleared that up, you should give me the tour. How did someone like you get to live in a level five house?”

“Military,” Steve says, and then wonders why he’s telling a stranger this.

“That how you died?” Tony asks.

Steve nods. “Yep. Had to put my plane in the water. I drowned, or froze. Not sure which came first.”

“So how come you’re not haunting the plane, or the country you died, then?” 

“No idea,” Steve shrugs. “I just.. Didn’t want to spend my entire life there. So I woke up as a ghost, and came to the last place I felt comfortable.”   


“Huh,” Tony says.

Steve wonders why he’s just told a random ghost (who could get him locked up at any time) the most personal thing he could.

“I died when my father figure pulled the plug on me,” Tony says.

“What?”

“That sounds hardly as bad as it was,” Tony says. “He came up to me and strangled me on the couch. Then I woke up in this wormhole type thing - scary, by the way. Less then two stars on TripAdvisor. I fell out the wormhole and woke up in the DoG Newbie Department.”

“I would say I’m sorry for your loss, but that doesn’t really work in this context. Since when did the DoG get a Newbie Department?”

“Since never. You move up as you do more houses,” he explains. “Everyone starts at green, which is lowest. So they all call it the Newbie Department, because everyone’s new, and kind of green.” Tony laughs. “And it’s okay, I got my revenge. I made sure the first house I got assigned to was his. It took me about five weeks to land him in hospital because his blood pressure got so high. Then he moved away, so I don’t need to worry about him ever again.”

“Why didn’t you kill him?” Steve asks.

“‘Cause then I’d have to deal with him for the rest of our lives,” Tony shrugs. “I don’t wanna take the chances of running into him before I’m ready to.”

“Smart,” Steve says.

“Well, I’ll have to deal with him eventually. Hopefully when he’s old and creaky and weak.”

Steve chuckles. “Well, I guess I better give the grand tour, then.”   
  


*

 

There are people looking at the house today. It’s been a week since Tony arrived, and he and Steve mostly keep to themselves. It’s not bad company, it’s just Tony wasn’t expecting it and nor was Steve, so it’s taken a while to warm up to one another.

Tony is sitting on the banisters, staring at the door. Steve is standing just behind him, staring too, with his arms crossed and doing his best to look intimidating.

“You know, unless they’re ghosts, they won’t be able to see you,” Tony says, watching the door handle turn painfully slowly.

“I know,” Steve says shortly.

The door opens, and the real estate agent leads a short (but lithe. Tony’s eyes catch on her well-defined biceps) woman with red, curly hair, a tall, buff man with blond-y brown hair and a short, mousy man with curly, dark hair and eyes trained on the ground in.

The estate agent isn’t short, but she isn’t tall either. She has strawberry blonde hair, a smart looking pantsuit and bright red heels on. She’s holding a clipboard, and the badge clipped to her belt loop declares her as ‘Ms Virginia Potts’.

“This is probably the cheapest place on our list,” she says. “It belonged to a soldier.”   


Tony’s eyes dart back to Steve’s. He’s glaring at the group.

“It’s four bed, three and half bath. Master bedroom is an ensuite, as is the guest room. There’s a full bath on the second floor, and a half bath on the ground,” Virginia continues. “Open plan ground floor, with a backdoor out the garden. Nice neighbours,  nice neighbourhood.”   


“Can we look around?” The blond man asks.

Virginia nods. “Go for it.”

“Come on, then, Clint,” The woman says, taking him by the arm. “Let’s go.”   


Clint and the woman head off upstairs, leaving the mousy man to tour the kitchen.

“Nice kitchen,” he remarks to Ms Potts.

She smiles, “It is, isn’t it? How do you like the rest of the house, Bruce?”

“It’s great,” Bruce says. “If Clint and Nat like it, then I think this is the one.”

“If Clint and Nat like what?” Clint shrieks, rushing down the stairs and sounding like a stampede of elephants. Nat follows at a much more elegant pace.

Steve glowers at Clint’s back.

“This,” Bruce says. “I think this is the one.”

“I think so too,” Nat says.

Clint nods enthusiastically.

“Are you taking this one, then?” Virginia asks, flicking through her clipboard.

Nat nods. “I think so.”   


“Perfect. We’ll have it all ready for you to move in in a week or so,” Virginia says. “If you want to look around a bit more, you can.”   


“Thanks Pepper,” Clint says.

“Thank you, Clint,” Virginia says. “Natasha, Bruce. I hope your move goes well.”   


“I do too,” Natasha says.

Steve stiffens behind Tony as soon as Pepper is out the door. “There’s another ghost here.”   


“There’s another- what?” Tony turns to stare at Steve.

“There’s another ghost,” Steve repeats. “Come on.”   


Then he’s off, stalking off towards the back door. Tony has to run to catch up.

“Jesus, if they train you to run that fast in military boot camp, then I might have to join up,” Tony says. Then he freezes because Steve is right. There’s another ghost. And it’s interacting with Natasha, Bruce and Clint.

“What?” Steve manages.

The ghost turns to them. They don’t look particularly surprised.

“Hi,” Tony says.

Steve nudges him. “Who are you?”

The new ghost holds a hand up to Clint when he turns questioningly. “Phil Coulson.”   


“What?” Natasha frowns. “There are more ghosts here? Why didn’t we feel them?”

Okay. Tony is confused. “How can they see you?”

“Can you let them see you?” Phil asks, instead of answering, holding a hand towards Steve and Tony.

Tony shrugs and throws all caution to the wind. “Sure. I’m guessing I have to touch you?” He says, whilst putting his hand on Phil’s.

Phil nods. “Yep. They can probably see you now.”

Tony turns to the three, who nod. “That’s awesome. How?”

Clint shrugs.

“Steve, come on. You should do this,” Tony says.

“Who’s Steve?” Natasha asks.

“Guy who owned this house,” Tony explains. He casts a look at Steve. “You alright, Steve?”

“Fine,” Steve says. “Just wasn’t expecting this.”   


Phil smiles. “It’ll be easier on all of us if they can see you too,” he says.

Steve nods shakily. “Sure. Okay.”   
  


*

 

In the end, they get along okay. Ish. 

Steve still feels out of place and affronted by having so many people invade his house in such a short space of time. And he is a little bit terrified that Phil or Tony will report him to the GDA.

Tony is okay with leaving Steve off the radar. Phil, not so much. But he doesn’t bring it up after the first (and only) time, where Steve channelled enough emotion to shove the dining table across the room. Which is an impressive feat. Besides, Phil is actually rarely around, and when he is, he spends the majority of his time with Clint. 

Which is weird, for a ghost. Tony has never (ever), in all his years of human and ghost life, seen a living-dead relationship. 

Clint, Natasha and Bruce are fun. At first, Tony thought Bruce and Natasha were together. But they act more like brother and sister. Especially at breakfast, when Clint is still grumpy and Bruce is horrifyingly awake. Natasha normally makes breakfast, generally pancakes. And Bruce wakes Clint up by dumping the entire mix over his head. 

It works well enough. There’s normally a strangled, assaulted sounding squawk that Tony has learned to listen out for and ignore. Then Natasha starts laughing and Bruce smiles so wide, Tony can practically hear it. 

Phil acts more like their parent then their friend, and Steve quickly fills the other parental position without hesitation. When Tony asks, he just says ‘I don’t want another picture frame broken, or to wake up to jelly in my eyes again.’ and leaves it at that. (Tony points out that Steve is a ghost; he can’t sleep. Steve just sighs and says ‘The point still stands’.)

It’s nice. Well, as nice as it can get for three dead guys rooming with three actual beating hearts, flesh and blood humans. 

(Tony is ultimately jealous of the food. And the touching. Clint is a baker, and Natasha swears by his chocolate cake and Tony is forced to watch her and Bruce eat it. He also has to watch Clint, Nat and Bruce curl up on the couch together and it makes him wish more than ever for physical contact.)

He hasn’t wanted to hug anyone in more than fifty years, but watching them be close makes him yearn for what he could have had, if Howard had loved him and Obie had loved him more.

 

*

 

He and Steve start sitting on the banisters together a lot. 

They have a clear view of the living room, where they can watch Clint, Bruce and Natasha cuddle, or the kitchen where they eat breakfast together. Phil normally sits in too, obviously used to being around humans because he just sits (well. Floats about three inches above) in a chair at the table and occasionally inputs into the conversation. 

Normally, they sit in silence, watching this family interact and laugh and break Tony’s heart.

“You okay?” Steve asks, nudging Tony with his elbow. 

Tony nods, eyes fixed as Natasha smears flour on Clint’s cheek. “Yeah.”

“You don’t seem it.”

“Guess I just.. miss it,” Tony shrugs. “I miss touching.”

“You miss living?” Steve asks in disbelief. 

“No! God, no.”

“What then?”

Tony chuckles. “I don’t miss living. I miss the things that came with living. Like touching, and eating, and sleeping. The only people I can touch here are you or Phil, but sometimes I just want to be, you know. Included in that,” he gestures into the kitchen, where Natasha and Clint have abandoned the chocolate cake mix in favour of dumping flour over one another. Bruce is sitting quietly in the corner, reading and trying to ignore the flour getting in his hair. “I guess I’m jealous,” Tony finishes. 

Steve is quiet. Then, “Yeah. I get where you’re coming from. It’d be nice to be included in everyday things sometimes. I don’t know how Phil does it.”

They watch Phil dart around brushing his hands through Clint’s hair. It doesn’t do anything but disrupt the hairs a bit, making Clint’s hair look more windswept than anything. When the sunlight catches, Phil’s hands look suddenly transparent. 

“They must have been living together for a while,” Tony says. “They all seem really close.”

Steve turns to look at him. Tony just stares straight ahead. “Weren’t you ever close to someone like that?”

Tony shrugs. “One person, maybe. Then she died, and then I died and I haven’t found her yet.”

“You’re looking for her?” Steve sounds surprised. “That could take forever!”

“Good thing I have it then, huh?” Tony says, bringing one knee up to rest his chin on it. Steve doesn’t say anything else, and nor does Tony. They just watch their four roommates in silence. 

 

*

 

Being a ghost sucks, Tony thinks, for about the fifth time that day. 

He’s already spent the first six years adjusting, and feeling sorry for himself. He’s already spent the first six years wallowing in the pain being killed, and the pain of being killed by someone he loved and his father trusted. 

Natasha and Clint are curled on the sofa, watching a movie Tony doesn’t know the name of. And he wishes, more than anything, that he could be curled up with them. Maybe he’s being selfish, but he just wants to feel something other than the cold sort of empty feeling every ghost gets when they’re living, but not really. His heart feels transparent and shimmery. 

It is, really, he thinks, when the sunlight that is forever pouring through the windows catches him. His arms turn pale and faint. Natasha and Clint laugh at something on screen. 

Phil and Steve and Bruce are.. out. Bruce is at the supermarket. He doesn’t know where Phil and Steve have gone, doesn’t know where they go. (But he misses Steve, and that thought makes him feel weird).

“Hey, Tony?” Clint calls, and the movie pauses in the middle of a sentence. 

Tony starts, and drags his eyes away from his see through arm. “What?”

“You wanna watch?” Clint asks, gesturing at the screen with the remote. 

Tony shrugs. “No, that’s alright.”

Natasha frowns. “Come on, Tony. Watch with us.”

(You don’t ignore Natasha) so Tony goes. Natasha gestures for him to sit in between them. 

“You’re quiet,” Clint says.

“Am I not normally?” Tony says. 

Natasha exchange a glance with Clint over his head. Then they say together, “no.”

“In fact, whenever you’re around, the rest of us can barely get a word in,” Clint adds. 

“Oh,” Tony mutters. “Sorry.”

Natasha moves to nudge him with her elbow, but pauses before she touches him (touching a ghost when you’re, well, not one, rarely ends well. It would either dispell Tony’s molecules and scatter him around the room until he could gather them and rebuild his body, or Natasha’s arm would pass right through him, which would be uncomfortable for him [you try having someone’s body parts shoved inside you] and painful for her [his body ran so cold {its a dead thing} that it would essentially feel like she was dipping her arm in liquid nitrogen]). “Don’t be sorry for it,” she says. 

“Do you normally apologise for not talking?” Clint asks. 

Tony shrugs. He feels completely transparent (and not just in the literal sense). 

“Did you have to be quiet before?” 

“I don’t think I want to tell you about before yet,” Tony says. 

Clint nods. “Okay. Can you tell us how you died instead?”

Fuck it all, Tony thinks. “Sure.”

“Really?” Natasha asks. 

“Wouldn’t have said yes if I wasn’t going to,” Tony says. “Sure you want to know?”

“Yes. Sure.”

“Well, my uncle killed me. He, uh, suffocated me, I guess. I went into cardiac arrest and he left me on my couch to die.”

“How long ago?” Natasha asks. 

“Fifty years, give or take. I was about thirty eight at the time.”

“So you’re eighty eight now?” Clint grins. 

“No, my body is frozen at the age of thirty eight. I won’t grow or age anymore. But my metaphorical heart keeps beating, so yes, in terms of how long I’ve spent on earth, I’m eighty eight,” Tony explains. 

“There was one thing Phil won’t tell us,” Natasha says, before Clint can make a comment on Tony’s supposed age. 

“And you think I can?” Tony says. “Fine. What do you want to know?”

“How you become a ghost.”

Tony grimaces. “I’m not supposed to tell you that.”

“But..?” Clint asks. 

“But I will anyway,” Tony says, grudgingly. “Okay. Not everyone can be a ghost, right? Otherwise the world would be absolutely teaming with them. Our world and your world would be overrun with the spirits.”

“Hold up,” Clint interrupts. “There’s more than one world?”

“Yes?” Tony says, like it’s obvious. “Has Phil really never explained anything of importance to you? Anyway, of course there’s more then one dimension. The Ghost dimension, the GD, where us ghosts come from, and the Mortal dimension, the MD, where you guys are from. There are more, like the Angel dimension, and the Undead dimension. The UD is my favourite. My friend hangs out there.”

“You have an undead friend?” Clint asks. 

“He’s not really undead. Its called undead because its where all the immortals go. They’re not dead, but they’re not really alive either. They don’t have beating hearts,” Tony says. “Okay, so you live in the MD, right? Ghosts in the GD. We cross over into the MD for jobs, which is how we rank. Well. sort of. You have colour ranks and number ranks. Your colour rank changes as you do more houses.”

“How do you do houses?” Natasha asks. 

“You get assigned one from the Management Offices. You either stay there until the resident dies, and you guide them either to the GD or the HD, depends how good they did in life. If they get to the GD and the GDA decide they’re no good, they get, you know. Dispatched. Or you quit after a few weeks and the house gets reassigned.”

“What’s the HD?”

“The Hell dimension,” Tony tells Clint. “Anyway. Your number level is based on how much you succeeded in life. So most kids are level zeros, so no one sends them out. Too young, they haven’t had much to live for. Military are always five or up. Adults and teens are generally somewhere in between. House assignments are ranked. If it’s a level three job, then level three or higher ghosts are recommended.”

“What level are you?”

“Four. This house is level five though. I was assigned here.”

“I thought Steve was assigned?” Natasha says. 

Tony shakes his head. “I was. Steve’s unregistered.”

“And that’s bad?” Clint asks. 

“Yep. Not punishable by metaphorical death, but he’ll be locked up in the GD if the GDA find out.”

“And GDA is Ghost Dispatchment Agency, right?” Natasha says. 

“Right. They’re like, the cops for us. The DoGaARP is our government. Department of Ghosts and All Related Problems. Everyone calls it DoG.”

“Hah! Dog. That’s awesome.”

“Well, you would find that amusing,” Natasha says to Clint. “But that just gives us background info. How do you become a ghost?”

“You want the actual, full process?” Tony glances skyward and lets out a long huff of air. 

“Yeah, kind of,” Clint says. 

“Okay. Well, it’s like- It’s like a disassociative episode, I guess. Your brain disconnects from your body until you’re staring at yourself. You kind of get pushed into, like a third world. Everything is completely different. You can move without moving, and stuff. Its completely weird, seeing your dead body with your own body. Threw me off completely.

“If you had a ghost assigned to your house, then they would lead you through to the GD. We all call them Double G’s; Ghost Guides. If you didn’t have one, then you can either find your own way, which is what most people do, or you can make like Steve. He was tethered, in one way or another, to his death site, so he wasn’t drawn to the GD the way most of us are. He gathered enough power to transport himself to the last place he felt safe, here. Then I got assigned here and then you lot moved in,” Tony explains. 

“Did you have a Ghost Guide?” Clint asks. 

Tony shakes his head. 

“You had to find your own way to the GD?” Natasha says. “Huh. Was it hard?”

“Uh, yeah. A little bit. I’d just died, and been betrayed by a man I love and trusted. Then I had to find my way to this place I had no idea even existed.”

“Shit,” is all Clint can say. 

Tony chuckles humorlessly. He wants more than anything to lean back into Clint and Natasha’s arms but he  _ can’t, _ and it makes him wish, not for the first time, that he was living again. He’s never told anyone alive how he died; most ghosts tended not to. Nearly everyone died boring in-their-sleep deaths anyway, and hearing it gets old after a while. 

And for those who didn’t, whose deaths were considered more exciting, in a sick sort of hierarchy, rarely shared how. And if they did, it was considered the greatest show of trust a ghost could present. 

Tony had never, not in a million years, expected that he would be telling his greatest secret to the living, to people he wouldn’t have been friends with even when he was alive. It would have made his blood, if he had it, boil and shiver and feel entirely unlike his own. 

Natasha hums sympathetically. “That’s.. Terrible, Tony. Thank you for telling us, though.”

“Well, I gotta start trusting you at some point, right?” Tony says flippantly, standing up. “I’ll, uh, see you around. Obviously. Since we all inhabit the same house. Bye.” Then he walks off, with that graceful lilt to his steps that all ghosts have, the one that makes them look like they’re floating.

Natasha and Clint are silent behind him, and if Tony had his way, he’s be walking out to the sound of badass explosions. As it is, the scene on screen is somewhat boring, full of actors who look like they don’t really want to be there. It’s not quite the dramatic exit Tony had planned, but it was all the more fitting, really.

 

*

 

Steve gets back from wherever he went in the early hours of the morning.

Tony knows this because he sat on the windowsill watching the sun set and the moon rise and the stars wink at him. And then he saw Steve out the corner of his eye, looking slightly surprised that Tony appeared to be waiting for him.

“Tony? What are you doing?”

Tony shrugs. “What does it look like?”

“Uh, brooding in the dark?” Steve sounds like he’s frowning.

“Stop shadowing,” Tony says, “Come sit with me. And I’m not brooding, thank you.”   


Steve comes, sliding into the otherside of the sill, so that his back was pressed against the wall, mirroring Tony’s position. Steve’s toes were resting on Tony’s (because Steve had horrifyingly long legs). “Did something happen?” He asks.

Tony shrugs again. “Sort of, I guess. I told Clint and Natasha how.. How it all went down.”

“You mean your..?”

“You can say it,” Tony says. He laughs, but it sounds fake. “Yes, I told them how I died. I told them all of it.”

Even Steve didn’t know all of it, yet. “Why?” Steve asks, though, not focusing on the fact Tony trusted two Living before him.

“They were asking how one become a ghost,” Tony says.

“And you told them?!”

“Oh, come on! It’s only fair, they do live with three of them,” Tony exclaims. He probably sounds too harsh right now, but he’s tired (even though that should be impossible) and he’s already bared his heart to two people today.

“Fair point,” Steve concedes. “Okay. Did you wanna talk about it?”   


Tony starts to shake his head, before stopping and shrugging. “I dunno. What is there to talk about? I told two actual, living people my only secret nowadays because apparently, I trust them now. And four people is more people than I’ve ever trusted in my life.”   


“Four? Who are the other two?”

“Bruce. And you, duh.”   


“What about Phil?” Steve asks. His cheeks have gone a little bit pink, high on his cheekbones, although that could be the moonlight. Or Tony’s imagination. “Do you not trust him?”

“A little, sure. But he seems like military, and I don’t trust military.”

Steve nods slowly. “Fair enough. Bad experiences with them?”

“You could say that,” Tony replies, deliberately not thinking of the time Howard sent him to military training (bad idea in itself, honestly, Dad. Sending a newly eighteen year old Tony to a bootcamp full of desperate young men. God, the press had had a field day. Howard had snatched him away as soon as news got out, but the generals still managed to get a few ‘lucky hits’ in. In both ways, you know?)

Steve doesn’t question Tony’s vaguely cryptic answer, and Tony’s glad for that. He just makes a soft noise of agreement and falls silent, staring at all the stars.

Tony doesn’t say anything either, instead staring at Steve stare at the stars.

Steve makes him jump a few minutes later, when he says, “I used to want to go up there, you know.”   


“Space?” Steve nods in confirmation.  “Didn’t everyone?”

“Hm. I died before they could get to the moon, though,” Steve says.

“When?” Tony asks.

“About 1942? Thereabouts, anyway.”

“So, you’ve been dead for, like, a hundred years?”

“Yep. One hundred and sixteen.”   


“So you were how old when you died?” Tony asks.

“Twenty seven,” Steve says. “Young, right?”

“Old enough to join the army,” Tony says. “I was thirty eight when I died.”

“That’s young, too. It’s not fair, is it?”

“Is the world ever?” Tony asks. It wasn’t meant to be rhetorical, but Steve takes it as such because he doesn’t answer. Instead he just stares at the stars again.

“Look,” Tony says, three or so minutes later. He points out the window, and the moonlight makes his finger shine. “There. The brightest one. That’s Venus. Named after the Roman goddess of love, and beauty. She was named Venus because she was the brightest planet in the sky.”

“That’s nice,” Steve says. “I didn’t know that.”

“Yeah. They actually flew past Venus in 1962, I think. They’ve probably landed on her now, though, haven’t they? I don’t really keep up with common news. It’s that saying, um, ‘We study the past to understand the present, we study the present to guide the future,’ or something. I think it was William Lund. It might have been past your time, I don’t know when he made that quote.”

Steve shrugs. “Fairly certain I’ve seen it in a museum somewhere.”   


“You’ve been to museums?” Oops. Tony sounds more surprised than he expected.

“Yep. I died, and became a recluse for about forty years. That’d be how I missed out on the moon landing, or something. When I realised I should be catching up on the stuff I missed, I figured a museum is a good a place as any to start,” he chuckles. “It’s not like I could go find a historian. What are the chances they’d even see me? And if they did, they’d want to parade me around like a trophy.”

“That is a very good point,” Is all Tony can say. “Or experiment on you.”

“Yeah. Had enough of that for one lifetime.”

“What? What, were you a POW or something?” Tony frowns. 

“No! No, it was one hundred percent consensual experimentation,” Steve says. 

“Well, see, now that sounds kinky.”

Steve chuckles. “It does a bit, doesn’t it? No, I was a very sickly kid. Weak. Had this whole laundry list of physical problems, you know, bad eyesight, asthma, scoliosis, fallen arches, heart arrhythmia, partial deafness, stomach ulcers, pernicious anemia.”   


“How were you even alive?” Tony frowns.

Steve huffs a laugh. “I was barely. I wanted to join the army, you know? But they wouldn’t take anyone with as many health issues as I had, so I lied on the form. And honestly, going through military training while asthmatic is not something I’d particularly like to do again. Anyway, there was this program going. Some guy created the ultimate steroid, or something. Turned me from this five foot four weakling to, well, whatever I am now.”

Tony whistles.

“Yeah,” Steve sighs. “I miss it, though. I miss a lot of things.”   


“Being a ghost does that,” Tony shrugs.

“Feels like the whole world is moving on while you’re stuck in one place?” Steve says. “Yeah.”

Steve doesn’t say anything else, so Tony doesn’t either.

 

*

 

It takes a while (longer than Tony wants to admit) but eventually,  he starts to see Natasha and Clint and Bruce and Phil as family.

Its nice, actually. Tony didn’t ever think he’d get a family again. 

Steve, however. Well, his feelings towards Steve confuse him. He’s heard of ghost on ghost relationships before, of course he has. But Tony hasn’t ever seen one, or even been in one. But now, with Steve, he kind of, well. Wants to be in one.

It’s not like it’s that weird, though. Sure, it’s sometimes frowned upon in the GD, but they’re not in the GD at the moment. And Steve is really cute. Hot. And like no one Tony has ever been with before. Although that’s not saying much, because the last person he was with was about fifty years ago. Hell, he doesn’t even know if he remembers how to kiss anymore.

But Steve wouldn’t ever be into him, would he? He’s definitely not the sort of person Steve would date. Besides, Steve is from the nineteen forties, his mindset is probably stuck in that time frame. And while Tony knows that being gay isn’t a problem, he’s not so sure Steve knows that. 

Although Steve hasn’t said anything about Clint and Phil yet. And that’s one weird relationship. It’s not so much the fact that they’re both men that bothers Tony, more the fact that Phil is an actual ghost and Clint, well, isn’t. It’s just.. Weird. And Tony hasn’t seen a living-dead relationship before, let alone know it possible. 

He’s found he spends more time thinking as a ghost than he used to as a human. It’s probably because of the whole immortality aspect- he has forever to do things, so why rush them?

He’s not so sure he likes thinking so much. 

 

*

 

Natasha realises. Of course she does. If Tony believed in past lives (which, actually, he kind of does) then she was definitely a spy in one. She sees him making side eyes at Steve, and staring at Steve, and doing everything possible to get close to Steve.

“Steve, huh?” She asks, leaning against the door frame.

Tony, leaning against the kitchen counters, doesn’t jump. He just turns to her in the weird floaty way that ghosts move (it makes dramatic exits really hard, by the way) and frowns. “Excuse me?”

“I’ve seen you. You make heart eyes at Steve all the time.”

Tony scoffs. “No, I don’t.”   


“Yeah, you kinda do,” Natasha tells him. “Why don’t you just tell him? If he doesn’t reciprocate the feelings, you can just go back to the GD and get assigned another house. And if it does work, you’ll have your own ghost-y relationship.”   


“It’s not that simple,” Tony shrugs.

“Then enlighten me,” she walks over to hoist herself on top of the counter, leaning her hair back to rest against the cupboards.

Tony avoids her eyes. “... I wouldn’t want to leave this house,” He says finally. “I’ve never felt like I have a family, but now I do, and I never would have expected that in my ghost years. And I don’t want to leave it, or ruin it. And besides, Steve died in the nineteen forties. He might still have the same ideas that a lot of people had back then. How do I know if he even supports homosexual relationships?”   


“He hasn’t said anything about Phil and Clint yet,” Natasha says.

“I think he’s in shock with them. Neither of us have ever seen a relationship with a human and a ghost, and I think that that shock is taking precedence. I don’t know, Natasha. I just don’t want to hurt him, or hurt our relationship now.”   


Natasha rolls her eyes. “Fine. But he’s going to notice you staring sooner or later. I’m sure you’d want to tell him before he thinks you’re creeping on him, or something.”   


Tony doesn’t reply, so she hops down and starts the coffee machine.

 

*

 

Natasha runs into Steve next.

He’s sitting (well, floating a centimetre above) the couch in the den, staring unseeing at whatever action movie Clint has put on and left on. Even though Clint isn’t in the room anymore. 

He doesn’t look around when she walks in, but his eyes do flick towards the door. Natasha smiles, knowing he’ll probably see it in his peripheral.

“You okay?” She asks.

Steve nods. “Yeah. Fine. Have you seen Tony?”

“Not since yesterday,” Natasha replies. “Why? Did you want to talk to him?”

“Yeah,” Steve says. “But it can wait.”   


“Doesn’t look like it can,” Natasha remarks, looking pointedly at his fingers, where they’re twisting themselves together in his lap. “Wanna talk to me about it instead?”

Steve starts to shake his head before changing tracks and nodding instead. “Can I?”

“Go for it.”

“Right. Well. Tony keeps staring at me.”   


Natasha knew Steve would notice.

“And I don’t know why,” Steve continues. “But I’m never able to catch him doing it. I just feel his eyes on me. And I don’t know why. Do you know why?”

Natasha nods. “I do. But it’s not my place to tell you. Sorry, Steve.”   


Steve mouths ‘Fuck’ to his lap. “Yeah. I just.. I don’t know. He’s confusing, right?”

“Right,” Natasha agrees.

“Right,” Steve nods. He looks lost. Like, really lost, and small, and sad, and Natasha just wishes she was able to hug him. She knows Bruce is looking into the science of ghosts, and stuff, and one day maybe they will be able to exchange touch without either the ghost disintegrating or whoever’s touching them feeling like their hand is frozen. Or both.

“Do you..? Do you like Tony?” Natasha asks him quietly.

Steve turns to look at her. “Like, like like?”

“Like like like,” Natasha confirms, smiling. Steve really is only a teenager, really. He must be barely thirty, if that. He’s lived so much, she thinks.

Steve’s cheeks go transparent, the ghost equivalent of blushing. Since there’s technically no blood left in their bodies, and no heart to pump it, embarrassment shows in different ways. Like their cheeks- or whichever body part would flush- fades slightly and goes faintly glittery. Natasha has only ever seen it happen to Phil, because apparently Tony doesn’t blush.

“Yeah,” Steve says, barely a whisper. “Yeah, I think I do.”   


“Tell him, then,” Natasha says.

“It’s not that simple,” Steve says. Because it never is.

 

*

 

Tony isn’t avoiding Steve. Really.

That’s just what it looks like. 

But he isn’t.

He just somehow manages to avoid being in the same room as him for an entire week. Or, well, as much of a week as he can before Natasha gets fed up and traps them in a room together.

And sure, they could get out by ghosting through the door, but that’s uncomfortable, and more often than not ends badly. And Tony doesn’t particularly want to risk it, you know?

But, well, it’d probably be better than spending however long Natasha wants them to spend locked in a room with his crush.

“So..” Tony starts.

“Have you been avoiding me?” Steve blurts out.

“What? No!”   


“Then where have you been?”

“I’ve been..” Tony pauses. Now that he thinks of it, it really does sound like he’s avoiding Steve. “I wasn’t actively avoiding you.” There. That sounds alright.

“So what, you were doing it subconsciously?” Steve sounds offended. Shit.

“No, I just-”

“‘Cause it feels like you’ve been avoiding me,” Steve says. “And I wanted to talk to you. Why were you avoiding me?"

Here goes nothing, Tony thinks. “Because I. I was- I was embarrassed.”   


“Embarrassed? About what?”

“I don’t know,” Tony says. “I just was. Because I like being around you, and I like being around here, and I didn’t want to ruin it with feelings so I just stayed away. And I’m sorry, and I really hope this doesn’t change anything between us at all, because if you don’t want this, then I hope things can go back to us being friends, because it feels like family, and I’ve never had family before and I’d really like to keep it.”   


“If I don’t want what?” Steve asks.

“This! Us, me,” Tony shrugs. “Because I love you.”   


Somewhere during this Steve got really close to him, and he reaches over to rest a hand on Tony’s cheek. “And if I do want this?” Steve asks softly.

“Then I’ll call you a fucking idiot, because why would you?”

Steve chuckles, his lips turning up at the corners. “Why wouldn’t I?”

Tony can’t answer that. He just looks up (and up and up and up) and into Steve’s eyes, which are blue and really really close.

Steve says, “I think I want to kiss you now.”   


Tony just nods, because holy  _ shit _ , he didn’t ever think this would ever happen ever.

Kissing a ghost is different to kissing a human. Tony’s not sure how, because he can barely remember how it felt to kiss anyone, but it’s different. Steve’s lips are kind of cold (that’s the dead thing), but Tony’s feel warm. Steve’s hands feel light and tingly on his hips and it feels nice. Really nice. 

Maybe Natasha was right. Maybe this wouldn’t be such a bad thing.

 

*

 

Honestly, dating Steve is literally the best thing Tony has ever done in all his thirty eight years of living and fifty years of non living.

Steve is amazing. Also a really good kisser. Tony forget how nice it was to be held, too. 

Clint is unbearable. He wolf whistles literally every time Steve and Tony walk into a room together, whether they’re holding hands or not. It takes Natasha violently threatening him to get him to stop (which reaffirms Tony’s suspicions that Natasha was a spy in a previous life).

He asks Steve.

“Do you believe in past lives?”

“Hm?” Steve glances away from the nature documentary he had asked Natasha to put on the TV.

“Past lives. Do you believe in them?” Tony repeats.

“I’d like to,” Steve says. “But I don’t know how they would work, what with ghosts existing too.”   


“Well, maybe someone only has a set number of lives. Like a cat, or something. And we’re ghosts, Steve. It can’t be that improbable. It explains deja vu, too. If you do something you’ve done in a past life time,” Tony says. “Anyway. That’s not what I was getting at. Do you think Natasha was a spy in a past life?”

Steve chuckles. “Maybe. She might’ve been a ballerina too.”

“Yes!” Tony exclaims. “Thank you.”   


Steve laughs again and pulls Tony into his side. And Tony doesn’t resist, because why on earth would he turn down a cuddle?

 

**EPILOGUE**

_ Some time in the future. But not too far. Just a little bit. Far enough for scientific discoveries. _

 

Tony ‘wakes up’ to Bruce thudding around the house, a little bit like a mad man.

“I’ve done it! Nat, Clint, wake up! I did it!”   


“Did what?” Clint grumbles.

“Figured it out!” Bruce exclaims.

“Bruce, I love you, we love you,” Clint says, “But it’s early, and you’re not making much sense.”   


“I did it,” Bruce insists. “The ghost biology, and the human biology. I figured it out. I know the compatibilites, and imcompatibilities. And then I figured it all out. Here, put this on,” Tony watches Bruce grab Clint’s wrist and fasten something that loooks like a shiny, silver bracelet to it. Then watches Bruce drag Clint over to Tony.

“Wha- what are you doing, Bruce?” Clint says.

“Do you trust me?” Bruce asks them, and Tony nods before he can think about it. So Bruce takes Clint’s hand and places it on Tony’s arm.

“What’s all the yelling about?” Natasha asks, rubbing her eyes and then freezing when she sees Tony and Clint standing there, practically holding hands. “Oh, my God.”

“I did it,” Bruce repeats. “Here.”

He gives her a matching bracelet, and Natasha comes over to join them, taking Tony’s other hand.

Tony grins at them, and pulls Natasha into a long hug. Finally.

Yeah. He never thought he would get a family. But hey, miracles can happen.

**Author's Note:**

> wooh.
> 
> i have been working on this for what feels like forever, and i dont know why its taken me so long. but here we are! yay! its an au! i've never read one of those fics where one is alive and the other dead, because i dont like them. so i thought hey you know what lets just. write this. 
> 
> comment how you thought, pretty please. or come yell at me over on the old [tumblr/](https://spideysstark.tumblr.com/) lets try these links again. ahh. if it doesnt work, i have a new blog, by the name of spideysstark.
> 
> see you later, loves! hopefully in the next chapter of its all fun and games?


End file.
